Ohio-based Larry Dean Harmon has been sentenced to three years in prison for operating a cryptocurrency service used by criminals for laundering millions of dollars, according to the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ).
Harmon, 41, ran a Bitcoin mixer called Helix that was “highly sought after by online drug dealers who needed to launder their illicit proceeds,” said a Nov. 15 statement from the department.
A mixer is a service that allows customers to send cryptocurrencies—in this case Bitcoins—to designated recipients in such a way that crypto owners remain concealed.
Helix was “one of the most popular mixing services on the darknet,” the DOJ notes. Between 2014 and 2017, “Helix processed at least approximately 354,468 bitcoin—the equivalent of approximately $311,145,854 in U.S. dollars at the time of the transactions—on behalf of its customers….